


Kicking In Unlocked Doors

by ruanyu



Series: All Things Counter [3]
Category: His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe - Daemons, Angst, Bucky Barnes Angst, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Returns, Crossover, Dark Tony Stark, Guilt, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt Tony Stark, M/M, Minor Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, POV Bucky Barnes, Past Abuse, Past Torture, Pepper Potts Is a Good Bro, Pepper Potts as Rescue, Protective Bucky Barnes, Protective Pepper Potts, Protective Steve Rogers, Self-Hatred, Timeline What Timeline, Tony Stark Angst, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Torture, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-15
Packaged: 2018-06-08 13:25:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6856849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruanyu/pseuds/ruanyu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Make this stop,” Bucky said, holding out the metal arm.</p><p>There was a tense sudden silence, the kind that happened when the soldier did something wrong.  </p><p>“You’re voluntarily asking me to disable your arm?” Stark asked, slowly.</p><p>Bucky nodded, wary. Stark looked like he was trying to look into his mind, to figure out how it worked. Bucky wanted to tell him it was a scum-ridden dark lake and sometimes torture and death and poetry rose out of the murky waters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kicking In Unlocked Doors

**Author's Note:**

> This is the third part of the All Things Counter series, and won't make much sense without reading the other parts first. 
> 
> Warning: Tony goes kind of dark in this one, but not irredeemably. I've tried to tag appropriately, let me know if I missed anything.

_You are kicking in unlocked doors - Where is your perception_  
_Turning the same stone all over again - Waiting for the exception_  
_Now The Poet says what The Parrot said - Collective recollection_  


Bombus - The Poet and the Parrot

 

Stark was a different man inside the enclosed space of his cluttered lab. There was more stillness to his restless energy, not so many distracting quips, and that made it difficult to avoid the intelligence of the strangely familiar dark eyes. This was Stark’s sanctum; they entered it on sufferance, granted an audience before their taciturn (if benevolent) host.

“The super soldier and his brainwashed assassin friend coming to visit little old me? I’m honored, truly,” Stark leaned back against one of his worktables, surprisingly strong arms crossed just under where the strange orb glowed faintly through his t-shirt. Bucky didn’t want to think about how that thing was lodged inside him, to imagine the bite of inhuman implements in raw mangled flesh. Had Stark screamed when it was done?

“False modesty doesn’t become you, Stark,” Steve said, dryly. 

“Everything becomes me, Cap,” Stark said, relaxed outwardly, only his shrewd gaze giving him away. His gaze shifted to Bucky. “You look less homeless without the mangy face fuzz, Tik-tok.” 

 _He doesn’t like us_ , Lobo informed Bucky.

_Tell me something I don’t know._

Bucky glanced at the African grey on Stark’s shoulder. She ruffled her wings, unhappy with their intrusion into her territory, eyes pinning and head turning as Arden conducted her usual slow-flight investigation of the room. Lobo sniffed cautiously, the smell of metal and chemicals disturbing, but did not move from Bucky’ side, eyes tracking a small trundling robot across the floor.

Bucky touched the fur on his neck. _Calm down._

“So? What do you want?” Stark asked. Like Bucky, he’d calmed his daemon with a quick touch. Bucky hadn’t seen him interact much with the grey in front of others. Why was that?

“Bucky wanted to speak with you,” Steve said.

Stark looked momentarily surprised. Not what he had expected. He turned again to Bucky, studying him, disconcertingly direct. “Well, Robocop?”

“He…asked to speak to you alone,” Steve said, shrugging slightly, his displeasure clear. When Bucky had made the request, Steve had wanted to know why, and Bucky had not known what to tell him. Steve had looked so perplexed that Bucky wanted to ask forgiveness, and just managed not to, turning away from Arden’s plaintive cry, a cry that took him back to the dark alleys where a little boy had tried not to weep about being weak, not knowing he had never been weak.  

Steve had not pressed him. Instead, he had nodded and gone away, and Bucky knew he had gone to see Sam. When Steve came back at last, he was reconciliatory, even sorry. “I’m not keeping you locked up, am I?” he’d asked, because he was honorable that way, and he’d be sorry if he felt he was keeping his once-friend a prisoner, even if it was necessary. “I’m not treating you like a child?”

 No, Bucky had said. He’d tried to reassure him. He must not have done a good job, because Steve had continued to look upset, and then told him he’d take him to see Stark first thing the next morning.

 They hadn’t counted on Stark not being too happy about the intrusion. Their host looked suddenly, unaccountably serious. Bucky felt an unwelcome tightness in his chest. This was important. This was necessary.

“I’ll come back when you’re done, Bucky,” Steve said, touching his shoulder briefly. Arden flew down towards them, balancing gracefully on Steve’s extended arm, then hopping onto his shoulder. Her fierce eyes glared. She was not happy either.  

“Wait,” Stark said, tersely, when they turned to leave. Steve stopped, turned, cocked an eyebrow. Stark cleared his throat. “Not your baby sitter.”

Steve narrowed his eyes. He was unamused. “Bucky just wanted to speak with you, Stark. He doesn’t need babysitting.”

 Stark took a while to reply, and when he did, it was short, grudging. “Fine.”

Steve inclined his head. “I’ll see myself out.” Steve gave Bucky one last ambivalent glance, before moving towards the door. Stark waited until it closed before he moved quickly into motion. He set his daemon down and she fluttered to the large enclosed aviary lining one side of the room, the door to it opening and closing behind her. Then he strode to stand before Bucky. “Have a seat,” he said. It was ostensibly an invitation, but the words were firm as a command. Bucky obediently sat down on the nearest chair. Stark stood over him, using the advantage of their difference in height now Bucky was seated, making Bucky crane his neck upwards. The soldier knew what this was. Intimidation.

“Why did you ask to speak to me alone, Tik-tok?” Stark asked, too pleasantly.

Bucky did not know how to make the request he needed to make. He opened his mouth, and then closed it.

“Spit it out,” Stark says, dark eyes intent on his face. 

“I…I hurt Steve,” Bucky said.

Stark’s eyes narrowed. “You what?”

“When I was sleeping. I was the soldier when I was dreaming,” Bucky said, words tripping over each other. “You need to stop it.”

Stark’s flat gaze did not waver. “How do you expect me to do that?”

“Make this stop,” Bucky said, holding out the metal arm.

There was a tense sudden silence, the kind that happened when the soldier did something wrong.  

“You’re voluntarily asking me to disable your arm?” Stark asked, slowly.

Bucky nodded, wary. Stark looked like he was trying to look into his mind, to figure out how it worked. Bucky wanted to tell him it was a scum-ridden dark lake and sometimes torture and death and poetry rose out of the murky waters.

 “Steve won’t be happy,” Stark remarked, finally, scrubbing a hand through his messy hair.

“I can’t hurt people anymore,” Bucky told him. He needed him to understand, the way Natasha understood. “Like I hurt Steve.”

Stark studied him for a moment without speaking. “Do you remember every time you killed, when you were the soldier?”

Bucky shook his head. He remembered waking out of the cold white newness, the shivering slow transition, the technicians buzzing around him, the blurry surroundings sharpening into too sharp detail. He remembered wanting to obey the voice, wanting commands. He remembered the calm that settled over him when he was after his target, the scent of blood, and the clean white that took everything away again. He remembered moments of murder, remembered killing people every conceivable way people could be killed.

“What do you remember?” Stark asked.

“Flashes. I think once…once I ripped someone’s gut wound open with this,” Bucky said, softly, distantly, nodding at the metal hand. “His insides spilled out onto the road.”

 Stark released a sharp breath. “Alright,” he said, finally, with decision. He cleared away papers and bits and pieces and then slapped the steel table nearby. “Shirt off and up on the table. Let’s take a look.”

Bucky stripped off his long sleeved shirt. He always wore shirts that covered as much as he could of the arm because Steve looked even more sad than usual when he saw the metal, and Bucky did not like him looking sad.

He flinched momentarily when he felt the cold steel surface against his back. Stark grabbed his metal arm as Bucky lay down, straightening it out to the side, ignoring the whirring as it adjusted to the sudden outside pressure. Bucky remembered technicians moving his arm like this, impassively, without waiting or asking. Like he was an object. He remembered the way they handled his daemon, like Lobo was no more than a cringing mongrel. “Am I human?” Bucky asked, without knowing he was going to ask.

Stark paused, clearly taken aback by the unexpected question. Bucky looked up at him. He wanted an answer. This question mattered. Steve would say yes, immediately. This man was less likely to want to make him feel better. It didn’t take much to know that Stark did not like him.

 Stark didn’t reply for a while. He frowned down at his work, concentrating, and then did something to the arm that made Bucky clench his teeth hard to not cry out. He didn’t pull away. Stark gave him a considering look. “What would make you not human?” he asked, finally. “Killing? Being Hydra’s weapon?”

“I’m not…I have this,” Bucky said, indicating the arm currently being pulled apart, gleaming and alien and terrible under the lights.

Stark tapped the glowing orb embedded in him. “And I have this. Am I human?” He shrugged. “What does it mean to be human? Some would say man is a mere talking animal not much more wonderful than a parrot.” He said the last sentence in a quoting voice. Bucky knew what quoting sounded like. The man who had owned him used to like quoting things, sitting in the chair before the fire, with his two wolves by his side, his daemon and his soldier.

A mere talking animal. Was that what he was? Bucky thought he remembered being called animal. He didn’t even do much talking then. There was the memory of the nameless daemon in the small dark cage, howling and whimpering and far away. There was the tightness in his chest that was the longing to reconnect. He’d wanted to be close, not just to his creature of darkness, but to the always there dreams of the small golden boy and his golden eagle.

“Not much more wonderful than a parrot,” Bucky repeated, distantly. He turned his head. The hyena regarded him seriously from the dark corner of the workshop. _Don’t listen to him. He wants to hurt us._

“That’s no insult, though, Tik-Tok,” Stark said. He glanced over at the African grey. “Isn’t that right, Liadan?” The grey chirped at him, head cocked, preening. “Wouldn’t worry about it too much,” Stark said then. “Humanness can be overrated.”

Stark shone a bright light down on the bionic arm, focusing on something that made the inhuman fingers twitch. Bucky concentrated on keeping still, subsiding into silence, watching him work.

 It was a while later when Stark told him about his idea. By now the bionic arm has been made unrecognizable, smooth plates lifted up, revealing the inside, the wiring that made him part machine. “I want to build in a trigger that will shut you down,” Stark said. It was offered calmly, this statement.

“Shut me down?” Bucky asked. Like the cryochamber?

 “Like when the Black Widow made your arm stop working. Only, I don’t want to have her throw the thing at you, if you ever snap, like you said you did with Steve. I want to build it into this thing.” He tapped the arm. 

Bucky remembered what had happened after she’d thrown the disc. It was incapacitating, but the pain was bearable. He only hesitated a few minutes before he nodded his assent. That would be good, for them to have the ability to stop him.

 Stark flashed his teeth in a white smile before behind his head to his work again. A short time later, he showed Bucky a little device that would control the shock. “Shall we test it?” Stark asked. “You ready?”

 Bucky nodded again. Stark counted down for him. The pain kicked hard. It started in his arm but raced upwards, outwards, through his whole body, making him arch upwards on the steel table, straining against nothing, for he had willingly submitted himself to this and was not restrained.

 Stark was standing too close over him when the not-too-bad pain stops. He gripped Bucky’ jaw to turn his head, to make him look up, to make him focus. This was familiar, though the grip, the fingers clenching, were less cruel. Stark wanted his attention, wanted something from him. 

“Did they ever tell you to make a kill look like a car accident?” Stark asked, very quietly.

 Bucky did not understand. He wanted to say something but he did not understand.

 Stark’s eyes did not move from his face. “Did you kill my parents?” He was staring intently at Bucky, as though he wanted to dig out something from behind his closed off blank-eyed face, to lever open the cage of ribs and reach through to tear out his heart, wanting indisputable proof of humanity.

 Bucky said nothing, because he did not know how to be convincing enough to answer the terrible need in the dark eyes. _I don’t know_ was never what people were looking for in an answer. He should have known better. This time there was no warning. The pain was worse. Bucky disappeared. The soldier screamed.

 “Tony?”

The soldier heard a woman’s shocked voice. The pain he was feeling dialed all the way down to nothing. He collapsed like a broken puppet with its strings cut and gasped for air, breath tight and shallow, head lolling.

 Running light footsteps from far away, and closer, too close, someone checking his pulse, whispering something, something that he must have been imagining, because why would anyone apologize to their weapon?

 “What is this?” a woman cried, too loud and too sharp. “What are you doing?”

 The soldier’s eyes peeled open with difficulty, to see, he needed to see. His body was shaking, hard, like the last leaf on an autumn tree in a gust of wind. Autumn was pretty. The woman’s hair was like autumn, the same color as her pretty vixen daemon.

 As soon as the soldier’s eyes opened, the dark-haired technician pressed something that made heavy restraints pull across the soldier’s body.

 The hyena whimpered far away in his dark corner. There was a moment when the soldier wanted to fight, but he pushed that down and looked at the technician, waiting for instructions, forcing the lines of pain in his face to go away, smoothening his expression into obedient calm. That's what he knew he should do after hurt, be quiet as quickly as possible. 

 The man was looking back at him. His face was ashen. The soldier knew why: the pain had gone and the soldier should not be shaking like this now, his hair sticking to his forehead with sweat, his breathing too quick, too loud. The technician needed him to be ready, to be quiet, to be obedient. Was someone coming to check on his work?

“Tony?” the woman said. It was sharp, like when the soldier needed to listen through the pain, listen for instructions. It tripped the technician into speech.

“He wanted a kill switch,” the technician said, strangely stilted. “I thought this would be better. Looks like I made him go full Robocop instead.”

“Better?” The woman looked furious. “It sounded like you were killing him.” The soldier wanted to tell her this is necessary for his maintenance. The technician knew what to do. Sometimes the furnace of pain was necessary to remould the soldier, who was _weapon-not-human._

“He agreed,” the man muttered. The soldier had agreed? Why did the soldier need to agree? He knew how dangerous it was to not understand what was happening. The uneasy feeling in his belly became a sourness that rose up to his throat, making him swallow bile. _He was being good now, he would be good._

 “To be tortured?” the woman retorted, eyes wide and disbelieving. “He agreed to be tortured?”

"That's not...that's not what this was," the technician said, defensive, like she was his superior. 

"What was it then?" the woman asked, after a pause bristling with too many feelings. 

The man and the women were standing face to face, their confrontation making no sense in the soldier’s mind, for they were inexorably pulled together, their anger climbing like ivy upon the scaffolding of passion.

The technician ran his hands through his dark hair, the shine of sweat on his grimy brow. “He came to me. Wanted me to disable the arm. Told me he’d hurt Steve. I can’t risk that happening again. I need to make sure I can stop him.”

The woman tried to reach out to touch the man’s arm. “Tony…”

The man turned sharply, away from her, dropping something that made a loud crashing noise. The soldier could not stop himself from reacting to the sound, from startling, from drawing uselessly away, and they both turn to look at him when he moved.

 The man’s voice was quiet, far away. “Nobody hurts my family, my friends. If anything happened to you…”

 The woman looked suddenly, unaccountably sad. “You’re not doing this for us, Tony. You’re not doing this for the living.”

 The man called Tony glared. “I keep telling you. I’m not a good man.”

“Don’t try that on me,” she said. The soldier thought that she would give good commands. She wouldn’t take any nonsense.

“Leave, Pepper,” Tony said. “Now.” 

“I’m not leaving,” she said, even, determined. She looked down at the solider, her pale face sharp and intent, her pretty hair pulled away neatly. He tried to show without saying that he would be good.

“Bucky?”

The soldier stared at her, not understanding, and confused by not understanding, wanting a command.

She looked sad…that he did not understand? He bit the inside of his cheek, ran his tongue over the ragged unevenness. It kept him from asking unsanctioned questions. He wanted them to tell him what he should be now. He needed to know what they wanted.

 “Close your eyes,” the technician told the soldier, chasing away confusion with the simple command. The soldier almost smiled as he closed his eyes obediently. It was so easy to obey. There was a strange smell. The world faded away into dark and quiet and nothing.

He woke to loud voices. “He’ll be fine, Cap.”

Stark. He had a reason to be wary of Stark.

“What the fuck happened?”

“Language. You swear now? When did _that_ happen?”

Bucky was covered with a heavy warm blanket. “Steve? he mumbled. He turned his head, blinking.

Steve was nearby, looking worried. “You alright?”

Bucky tried to sit up. Steve helped him, arm strong around his back. His eyes were wide, filled with concern. “Stark said you…uh…lost consciousness…when he was fixing your arm. He said you told him it needed repairing. Why didn’t you tell me there was something wrong?”

Bucky did not immediately know what to say. This happened too often.

Stark was in his usual casual act, but it wasn’t working, the strain around his eyes putting the lie to his blasé attitude. “Here,” he said, and tossed Bucky his shirt.

Bucky caught it and pulled it on. He remembered pain. That was not strange. He was confused about what happened before. That was not strange either. He knew that Stark was watching him too closely. He remembered fingers clenching against his jaw and the need in those dark eyes.

“Are you alright?” Stark asked, quick glances scanning Bucky’s face for clues beyond the rote reply he expected.

Bucky nodded. “I’m fine. I’m sorry.” 

Stark exchanged a quick undecipherable look with Steve. “Don’t apologize to me, Tik Tok,” he said. His jaw was clenched, arms crossed against his chest. 

Steve frowned. “Why, Buck? Why didn’t you tell me there was a problem with your arm?”

“Didn’t want to bother you,” Bucky said. He swung his legs down and stood, pleased to discover there were no after effects to what had happened. Lobo trotted up to him, pressed against him, whined, being too obvious, too needy. Bucky ignored his daemon. _Don’t pretend you don’t remember,_ Lobo told him.

“Don’t forget,” Stark said, unknowingly echoing the daemon. “I’m always here if you need help.” Bucky knew what a warning sounded like when he heard one, but he tried to nod in response anyway, forced out a “thank you.”

Stark looked worn around the edges, tired, like he hadn’t slept for days. Bucky had made him responsible for the soldier, laid any future crimes the soldier might commit at his feet, and he felt the too familiar weight of guilt. 

The grey parrot was out of her aviary, sitting nearby, plucking agitatedly at her chest feathers. When they passed by her, the hyena made one of his most menacing sounds, a low-throated rumble reverberating in his throat. The parrot flapped her wings, beady eyes fixed on the hyena. She looked skittish, her ash-grey feather puffing out, throwing back a funny little parrot growl. Bucky would have laughed, but he did not want to antagonize their watching host.

Stark picked the parrot up, gave her a gentle head scratch as she bobbed her body to him, turning his back on them to soothe her, the set of his shoulders tense. Bucky wanted to tell him they didn’t have to be friends. He wanted to say that what he had done already was enough to put Bucky in his debt. He did not say any of this. Everything that needed to be said would have taken too long to say, and Bucky had not had much practice explaining himself.

 He turned to Steve. “Can we go back now? Back home?” he asked. It came out too quiet and serious. Not back now but back then, to before, to the strange-familiar streets in the photographs. To uncomplicated friendship. To easy laughter and quick quarrels that followed one another like rain and shine. To a blonde skinny boy who looked at him without pity. Who looked at him like he was brave and good.

Thankfully, Steve pretended not to understand his meaning, and if his eyes were too bright, Bucky would not tell anyone. “Home,” he repeated. “Yes. Let’s go home.”

**Author's Note:**

> This series is a work in progress.


End file.
